The Jodi Fisher Horowitz Professorship of Leukemia Care Excellence

Jodi Horowitz

Established in 2013 by Jerome and Anne C. Fisher and George A. and Lydia Bravo Weiss, the Professorship honors the memory of Mr. Fisher’s daughter Jodi Fisher Horowitz (1960–2009), who was a fashion executive and advocate for cancer research and care.

Jodi Horowitz served on the Abramson Cancer Center Director’s Leadership Council and, with her father, co-founded “Shoes on Sale,” a major fundraising program of the Fashion Footwear Association of New York (FFANY). “Shoes on Sale” has significantly benefited the nation’s leading breast cancer research organizations, including the Abramson Cancer Center. Jodi Horowitz and Jerome Fisher were honored by FFANY as Humanitarians of the Year in 2003.

A Wharton graduate, Jerome Fisher (1930–2016) co-founded Nine West, a leading American shoe designer and retailer. With his wife, Anne, he was a long-time champion of the University, where their philanthropy supported, among other areas, the Anne and Jerome Fisher Fine Arts Library, the Fisher Hassenfeld College House, the Jerome Fisher Program in Management and Technology, and, at Penn Medicine, an endowed professorship honoring Arthur H. Rubenstein, MBBCh. Mrs. Fisher was an Overseer of the School of Design for 10 years; Jerome Fisher served on the Penn Medicine Board and was an Honorary University Trustee Emeritus.


 

David L. PorterCurrent Chairholder
David L. Porter, MD

David L. Porter, MD is the inaugural Jodi Fisher Horowitz Professor of Leukemia Care Excellence at the Perelman School of Medicine and Director of the Blood and Marrow Transplantation Program at Penn Medicine.

An authority on blood and bone marrow transplantation and hematologic malignancies, Dr. Porter has authored more than 120 research articles and book chapters. In pursuit of a cure for blood cancers, he has been a long-time collaborator in the immunology trials led by Carl H. June, MD, the Richard W. Vague Professor in Immunotherapy at the Perelman School of Medicine. Their work has yielded promising results for adult and pediatric patients with several types of deadly refractory leukemias.

Among his many honors, Dr. Porter has received the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society Service to Mankind Award for “his dedicated service to the highest standards of the medical profession, his humanistic approach to patient care, and his tireless efforts in researching cures for blood cancers.”